An Author's Escalation

From a very low five figures to a pair of transatlantic sales totaling almost seven—that was the recent history of author Jennifer Donnelly, whose first novel, The Tea Rose, proved a hard sell for Writers House agent Simon Lipskar and ultimately went to St. Martin's for a very low five figures. The book got excellent reviews, however, and SMP did well with foreign sales. Meanwhile, fellow agent Steve Malk sold a YA novel by Donnelly, A Northern Light, at auction to Harcourt. So when Lipskar had a two-book deal on offer, including a Tea Rose sequel, a considerable bidding struggle ensued. This was eventually won by a major six-figure North American rights bid by Hyperion's Peternelle van Arsdale, and she was immediately joined by another large bid by Susan Watt at HarperCollins UK. Lipskar speaks warmly of his author as "an incredible, natural storyteller" with some of the qualities of Maeve Binchy and Rosamund Pilcher.